Horace Edward Moore
Horace Moore studied law in Birmingham, England where he was born and majored in philosophy at Milton University in Baltimore, Ohio. In England, he was on the reviewing staff of the Birmingham Daily Post for three years. He came to Canada in 1911 and was court stenographer in Vancouver, clerk and treasurer for Salmon Arm, British Columbia, editor and publisher of the Salmon Arm Observer and a reporter for Dunn and Bradstreet. In 1932, he took over the Whitehorse Star.1)
Until Moore arrived, all type at the paper was set by hand and the machinery was run by a gas engine. Moore put in electricity and reconditioned an old linotype.2) In 1938 he acquired a linotype printer and an operator to increase the paper’s size from four pages to six. Commercial printing paid the bills. He won an award for the best paper under 500 circulation given by the Canadian Weekly Association. In 1942 the Alaska Highway construction and associated projects brought a flood of new-comers to the territory. Printing orders went up for letterheads, record forms, tickets and contracts. He bought a new automatic press and hired two assistants, two of them part-time army men.3) The paper won the Charters Cup in 1942, an award of the Canadian Weekly Newspapers Association for the best all-round weekly newspaper with a circulation of five hundred and under.4)
When the United States Engineers first came to town they asked about incorporation and if water and sewer systems could be put in. Moore told them that they would have to practically rebuild the whole town because there was hardly a house worth living in. In 1944, the eight-page paper had a circulation of four hundred. At that time Moore was described as a short grey-haired man with a scholarly air. He was a fellow of the American Geographical Society and a member of the American Assoc. for the Advancement of Science and the American Microscopical Society.5) Moore sold the paper to Tom Bain in May 1950.6)